A consortium of European pro-Palestine institutions and activists on Saturday called for the need to stand up for Palestinians’ rights, stop Israeli illegal settlement, prosecute Israeli war criminals, and lift the Gaza siege. Addressing a large audience at the European al-Wafaa Conference for the Relief of Gaza, held in the Dutch city of Rotterdam, professor of political science at the University of Amsterdam, Ana Tung, urged the pro-Palestine activists and politicians based in the Netherlands to immediately step in so as to make sure Israel’s terrorism against Palestinians would not re-occur in any form. Having personally been to Gaza a few years ago, Tung said the situation in Palestine needs serious efforts to work out the tragic state of affairs. Fridz Idlingz, in charge of the Arab-Austrian Relations Committee, raised alarm bells over the countless hindrances lying ahead of the Gaza reconstruction process particularly Israel’s potential infringement of ceasefire accords during the reconstruction or post-reconstruction phases. Danish activist Tomi Nelson said the very meaning of a peace process can only see the day when Palestinians restore their rights and freedoms and when the notorious Gaza siege and the Israeli illegal settlement expansion are brought to a standstill. Jewish-French activist Olivia Zemor drew attention to the need to step up pressure on the Israeli occupation via the so-called Boycott-of-Israel campaigns and the crossing out of all cooperation accords with Israel. Two Danish female participants, speaking on behalf of a pro-Palestine organization based in Denmark, said they received pledges to donate 15 ambulances and called for urgent intervention to ensure the package be dispatched to the Gaza Strip as soon as possible.

Israeli navy gunboats opened machinegun fire at Palestinian fishermen while fishing off the coast of Gaza on Saturday morning. Nizar Ayyash, the chairman of the Palestinian fishermen syndicate, said that the gunboats opened fire at dawn on fishing boats off the central coast of Gaza. “The shooting did not cause any casualties, but the fishermen were forced to abandon fishing and return to shore,” he added. The shooting is the latest in a series of Israeli violations of the truce agreement brokered by Egypt between Israel and Palestinian factions.

The American journalist Steven Emerson revealed in a new report published by the Terrorism Research Center interesting details about Israeli soldier Oron Shaul's capture since the first days of Israel's land offensive on Gaza. According to the report, the armed wing of Hamas made a startling announcement on that Sunday evening saying it had captured soldier Oron Shaul. “To prove its claim, Hamas released photos of Oron’s ID and other items he carried on him. To further bolster its claim, Hamas hacked into Oron’s Facebook page and posted claims in Arabic, Hebrew and English that it had him. Hamas taunted the Israeli public with cruel and sadistic propaganda on the hacked Facebook page.” “On Monday, July 22, as international news reports carried Hamas’s claim of capture of Oron, the IDF really had no idea what happened to the soldier, Emerson added. The only statement made by the IDF at that point was that Oron was missing in action. Even two days later, the IDF still did not know if he had been kidnapped by Hamas or was dead.” “But in hacking Oron’s Facebook page, Hamas may have inadvertently given away the location of the terrorists who had him or his body. That’s because whenever a Facebook account is accessed, Facebook’s servers automatically keep a record of the Internet Protocol address where the account was accessed. IP addresses can provide a location of the IP address where the Facebook account was hacked.” “In addition, there was a remote possibility that Oron had been carrying his cellphone, although Israeli soldiers are not supposed to take their cellphones into battle. But if he had done so, then it was theoretically possible that Hamas had hacked into the mobile Facebook application on his phone. If the Israelis could obtain the Facebook server data as soon as possible, they might have had a chance to find the whereabouts of the terrorists who took Oron.” “Israel made an urgent appeal to the FBI for help in trying to determine the remote source or information that would be stored on Facebook servers indicating the location where Oron’s page had been hacked into.” “Upon receiving the request from Israel in Washington on July 21, the FBI immediately issued a “preservation letter” to Facebook ordering them to preserve all data saved on their server pertaining to the Oron’s account.” “The FBI contacted a United States Attorney’s Office in a nearby district to initiate the legal process to get a court order to serve Facebook for server information on the account belonging to the soldier.” However on July 22, the US Attorney’s Office received a startling response from the FBI: “Thank You for your effort, input and assistance. I regret to inform you we have been denied approval to move forward with legal process. We were told by our management we need a MLAT [a standardized legal agreement between the United States and other countries that spells out the legal and diplomatic protocols in processing requests for legal information pertaining to court cases in either the United States or in another country] in order to continue to assist our partner with the request in question.” Those words put an immediate halt to the Israeli request. “Three days later, on July 25, after an exhaustive forensic investigation, the IOF concluded that Oron Shaul was dead."

Head of the Palestinian Businessmen Association, Mr. Ali Al-Hayek, stated that a delegation of international observers arrived on Wednesday, to the Gaza Strip, to monitor the Gaza reconstruction process.

According to Al Ray Palestinian Media Agency, Al-Hayek added that the delegation would observe the delivery of construction materials to enter the coastal enclave, explaining that reconstruction of the region will begin soon.

Construction materials arrived in Gaza on Tuesday, and have been stored at the UNRWA centers until the observers begin their work.

He further stated that more construction materials will arrive in Gaza via Abu Salem commercial crossing, which has been closed for three days due to the celebration of the Jewish Sukkot holiday.

Hamdallah: only half of Cairo pledges to be spent on reconstruction The Government of India has pledged $4 million in contributions to the Palestinian National Early Recovery and Reconstruction Plan for Gaza, designed by the Palestinian Authority, according to a Thursday statement by the Representative Office of India in Palestine.

The statement quoted Indian Minister of External Affairs, Sandeep Kumar, according to WAFA, saying that an “early realization of the objectives of the Cairo Conference will be an important element in the consolidation of the current ceasefire understanding between Palestine and Israel.”

Mr. Kumar praised Egypt’s role in the current ceasefire between Palestinian resistance forces and Israel, and affirmed that an early and sustainable resolution of the root cause of the conflict is imperative.

Kumar headed the Indian delegation to the Cairo Donors’ Conference on October 12, accompanied by Mahesh Kumar, India's Representative in Ramallah and Ambassador Navdeep Suri, Indian Ambassador in Egypt.

Though international donors pledged a total amounting to some $5.4 billion, Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah asserts that only half of the money pledged will be dedicated to Gaza reconstruction, while the other half will be spent on other Palestinian needs in the coming three years.

At a joint news conference with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Mooon in Ramallah, Hamdallah said that Palestinians' main goal was to end the Israeli occupation.

Palestinians shall never barter the Judaization of holy al-Aqsa Mosque for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip, senior Hamas leader Salah al-Bardawil said Wednesday, vowing that none of any such Palestinian underpinnings shall ever turn into bargaining chips. Addressing the masses during a pro-Al-Aqsa rally staged by Hamas in Khan Younis, south of Gaza, on Wednesday, al-Bardawil said: “To whoever dares to barter the reconstruction of Gaza for Jerusalem, we tell them, with no holds barred: whatever has been constructed can never be deconstructed. Whoever has set up roots in Gaza will never tolerate that holy al-Aqsa be destroyed.” “You’d better keep this in mind,” al-Bardawil declared. “With an unbreakable honor and faith in Allah, we inform you that you’ll never manage to divert the world’s attention from what is going on in at al-Aqsa, no matter how much you’ve been misled into believing . . . that the moment has come by to reap the fruits of such a coalition [with the U.S. and the West], embark on the Judaization of holy al-Aqsa . . . and enforce a spatio-temporal division on the Mosque.” Bardawil called on the Arab and Muslim masses to rise up and stick up for their holy mosque. He further urged the Palestinian Authority (PA) to halt its security coordination with the Israeli occupation, the most antagonistic of all conspirators against Muslims and Palestinians. Bardawil retorting to PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’s statement said: “These men [the resistance fighters] are not militias. Our people cannot accept to be chaired by a president who dares dub our resistance fighters militias. These are our real heroes. You shall soon reckon who are our real men, just as the others [Israelis] will.” Meanwhile a consortium of Palestinian non-governmental organizations on Wednesday expressed deep disappointment over the statements released by the UN’s Ban Ki-moon over the tight interconnectedness between the Gaza reconstruction process and the resumption of peace talks. Such a position “does not manifest of a real will to end the occupation” a joint statement read. It is rather a sign of a desire “for re-adopting the former path, upheld for over 20 years and exploited by Israel to impose a new fait accompli via policies of settlement, wall, Judaization, and the siege.” The organizations expressed hope that the UN’s top official would work on restoring Gazans’ rights, alleviate the casualties’ agony, and push for halting the Israeli occupation.

Israeli gunboats have again opened fire on Palestinian fishing boats off Gaza city shores, on Tuesday, at dawn.

According to Walla Hebrew news site, Israelis opened live fire on the fishermen and their boats, claiming that the men didn’t respond to their calls to move back.

The Israeli navy has attacked Gaza fishermen several times since the Gaza ceasefire took effect, Al Ray Palestinian Media Agency reports.

The terms of the truce provide that Israel must cease such attacks and further expand the fishing zone, over time.

However, Israeli soldiers and civilians alike have not only continued with daily violations against the Palestinian people and their property, but have increased restrictive measures and hostilities across the region, including illegal settlement construction and expansion.

According to the Palestinian News Network, an Israeli paper stated that Netanyahu alongside many Israeli officials during their meetings with Ban, and tried to convince him of not proceeding with an international investigation around the case of Gaza, claiming that Israel is pursuing "private investigations" that 'will be shown to the UN'.

Additionally, the UN chief is said to have stressed that the decision of the international investigation cannot be withdrawn, saying that he will await the UNHRC investigation results, and that he wishes Israel to assist the council members in the procedure.

Reliable sources reiterated to the PNN today's news from Haaretz, which focused on US Secretary of State John Kerry's pressure on Palestinian President Abbas to resume negotiations with Israel and adopt different claims, that Abbas might refrain from going to the UN Security Council.

President Abbas has reportedly refused.

Palestinian sources say that Kerry has assured that he had new ideas for restored negotiations, but wanted to take approval from president Abbas before revealing any details.

PLO secretary, Yasser Abed-Rabbo, said that the Palestinian Authority has refused to go back to negotiations as before, since they fruited nothing but growing Israeli persecution and aggression, topped off by the latest Israeli assault on Gaza which killed nearly 2,150 people.

Senior Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahhar on Tuesday dubbed the recent statements released by the UN’s Ban Ki-moon on Hamas resistance tunnels a reflection of Ban’s “double standards” and “political hypocrisy.” Zahhar said in a brief statement that the Israeli occupation’s military arsenal and nuclear reactor are far more destructive than Hamas’s resistance tunnels. Zahhar’s comment was voiced shortly after Ban Ki-moon said following a field visit to the Gaza Strip and Israeli border areas on Tuesday: “No one needs live under the constant threat and fear of rockets and tunnels digging underground.” Observes found Ban’s surprise after entering a Hamas resistance tunnel an “over-exaggerated” and “biased” reaction for “hadn’t Israel’s rockets killed at least 2,100 Palestinians, mostly civilians and innocent children, and left some 11,000 wounded?” a political analyst inquires. “Are Palestinians, or any colonized nation on Earth, expected to remain tight-lipped when their own and only homes are being turned into mounds of rubble?” another wonders. Meanwhile, the Palestinian Non-Governmental Organizations Network (PNGO), along with a consortium of Palestinian organizations for human rights, said in a joint statement on Tuesday afternoon: “We were expecting Ki-moon to drop in Gaza during the latest Israeli offensive, as a solidarity move with the Strip, and to use his moral power to halt the aggression” The organizations expressed hope that the UN’s top official would work on restoring Gazans’ rights, alleviate the casualties’ agony, and push for halting the Israeli occupation. The statement further spoke out against the shocking apathy and complicity maintained by the international community vis-à-vis Israel’s systematic terrorism and flagrant violations of human rights and international humanitarian laws, felonies that often amount to “war crimes and crimes against humanity.” The institutions pushed for the prosecution of Israeli war criminals so as to ensure that aggression against Gaza civilians would not re-occur in any form.

The Popular Committee Against the Gaza Siege has warned of the serious hindrances lying ahead of the Gaza reconstruction process due to the “insufficient” building materials allowed access into the Strip. The reconstruction materials “are not up to par and do not in any possible way fit the huge damage and the projected reconstruction mechanisms,” the anti-siege committee said in a statement on Tuesday. “We detected the entry of limited quantities of reconstruction materials via the Karem Abu Salem crossing [Gaza’s sole commercial entryway]…. This is not enough. Greater quantities, that should meet Gazans’ needs, have to be allowed in,” the statement further read. An estimated 6,000 tons of cement, 2,000 tons of steel, and 9,000 tons of gravel are needed on a daily basis to carry out the reconstruction projects, the committee confirmed. Meanwhile, Mounir al-Ghalban, of Gaza's border authority, told Anadolu News Agency: "Trucks carrying construction materials have begun to enter the Gaza Strip." Ghadban said that 15 trucks carrying cement, ten carrying steel, and 50 carrying gravel were due to enter the Gaza Strip to initiate the reconstruction of what has been destroyed by the notorious Israeli 51-day offensive.

UN chief Ban Ki-moon demanded Tuesday an independent probe into Israel's deadly shelling of a school during the Gaza conflict, expressing shock at the devastation during a visit to the Palestinian enclave.

Two days after donor states pledged $5.4 billion to rebuild Gaza, Ban toured some of the areas worst hit during the July-August war between Israel and the territory's Hamas rulers.

"No amount of (UN) Security Council sessions, reports or briefings could have prepared me for what I witnessed today," he said after being driven through the ruins of Gaza City's Shujaiyya district and the nearby Jabaliya refugee camp.

The secretary general was speaking at a UN school in Jabaliya, where Israeli tank shells slammed into two classrooms on June 30, killing at least 14 people sheltering there.

"The shelling of the United Nations school is absolutely unacceptable. These actions must be fully and independently investigated," he said.

Relatives of the dead held up posters showing their loved ones and disabled casualties waited to see Ban.

The UN chief also called on Palestinian militant groups to cease firing rockets at Israel from the territory.

"I repeat here in Gaza the rockets fired by Hamas and other military groups must end. They have brought nothing but suffering," he said.

One classroom, now repaired, had the words "every human being has the right to life" written on its walls.

After meeting with members of a new Palestinian consensus government, Ban told reporters the devastation he had seen was worse than that caused in the previous conflict of winter 2008-2009.

"This is a much more serious destruction than what I saw in 2009," he said.

Ban, who last visited in 2012, said at a donors conference in Egypt Sunday that his trip to the enclave was "to listen directly to the people of Gaza."

He said the international pledges of reconstruction aid were "quite encouraging."

Donations include $1 billion from Qatar, $212 million from the United States and 450 million euros from the EU.

Provision of the aid will be overseen jointly by the UN and the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority, amid concerns that unchecked imports could fall into the hands of militants, including those of the Islamist movement Hamas.

Hamas and its rival Fatah, which dominates the PA, signed a unity deal in April under which the consensus government was sworn in.

Ban welcomed the rapprochement.

'Great opportunity'

"This is a great opportunity to unite the West Bank and Gaza under one Palestinian leadership," he said.

Ban said the funds would go towards the "urgently needed" building of infrastructure and homes in Gaza, where nearly 2,200 Palestinians, mostly civilians, were killed and tens of thousands displaced in the 50-day war.

On the Israeli side, 73 people were killed, mainly soldiers.

At Sunday's conference in Cairo, Ban said "the root causes of the recent hostilities" were "a restrictive occupation that has lasted almost half a century, the continued denial of Palestinian rights and the lack of tangible progress in peace negotiations."

On Tuesday, he urged Israeli and Palestinian leaders to revive peace talks.

"I'm asking the leaders of both parties ... to resume their talks," he said. "Otherwise it's a matter of time that the violence will continue."

Ban said a first shipment of building materials was on its way to Gaza through Israel under an agreement reached last month.

"I'm very happy to announce that the first truck carrying ... construction materials is coming to Gaza today," he said.

The Israeli army said it had "transferred construction materials to the Gaza Strip in order to facilitate rehabilitation projects."

It said the supplies were "expected to include 600 tons of cement, 50 trucks of construction aggregates and 10 trucks of metal."

On a visit Monday to the West Bank city of Ramallah, Ban criticized continued Israeli settlement expansion.

"I once again strongly condemn the continued settlement activity by Israel," he said, echoing international condemnation of plans for new settler homes on occupied Palestinian territory.

The White House and European Union have criticized Israel's approval in September of 2,600 new settlement units in Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem.